You're asking me?

My friend calls and wants some fashion advice.

Judy is going to a Big Band concert/dance at which family members will be playing, and she isn’t certain about what to wear. This would not be a problem if the event were held locally. People here generally do not dress up and basically wear what they want. I went to a wedding once where the bride’s grandfather arrived in a Dickey work shirt and pants. I have been to funerals where mourners came in bib overalls.

This is not local though, this is in St. Louis. St. Louis is the "big city." I have never been to an event like this in St. Louis to see what everyone else is wearing. I don't know if they have adopted the "California casual" attitude that is common back home, or if they are more upscale and elegant. But I imagine what might be okay in our little rural town might not blend in well with the crowd there.

I burst into laughter—not because she needs some help—but because I do not think I am the best person to be asking about this sort of thing. I clean up fairly well, but I don't have a very well-honed sense of fashion or style and have always “depended on the kindness of strang…” uhh, I mean my sister, to find appropriate clothes for me to wear to dress-up events. It is a shame Judy can’t call my sister and ask her.

But, she is my best friend. so I give it a shot. Judy describes a few things she is thinking about wearing, and they sound quite nice, and I agree that those will almost certainly be perfectly fine.

I laugh some more, and we hang up.

Just about then Richard comes in to tell me he is going to town, and I describe the conversation, and he laughs too.

Then says “You do realize that your shirt is inside out.”

Well no, I didn’t, unfortunately. I had gone to town that way earlier in the morning to run errands, and I was on display at the park, where I walked twice around the perimeter with another woman, at the bank, the grocery store, and the post office.

Did anybody notice? Probably not. But still…

Let the Adventure Begin...Again

“I found my missing compression stocking!”

I had an extensive blood clot in my leg several years ago that damaged the valves in some of the veins. I was strongly urged to keep my leg elevated, which I do by propping it on some storage containers under my work space, and to wear a compression stocking, which I also do. I have several types: some with open toes, some with open toes that I have sewed shut because they tend to creep up over the ball of the foot, and then there is my favorite, a skin-tone closed-toe model that feels silky like a nylon stocking.

I put the compression stocking on in the morning before I go off to exercise, and I usually peel it off in the evening when I am in the recliner reading. It frequently ends up in the crack between the cushion and the arm, which is where I expected to find it this particular morning. I didn’t.

Okay, sometimes I take it off when we are in bed watching TV after dinner. Perhaps it was under the covers. It wasn’t.

I had gone fuming around the house searching several other places where it might be, and had announced my frustration at not being able to find it.

I have a bad habit of picking something up and intending to put it away but then getting distracted before I get there and putting it down someplace not even close to where it should be and then forgetting where I set it down.

“Well,” he wants to know, “where was it?”

“Oh, I put it back in the drawer where it belongs.”

“WHAT?” Are you crazy? Putting it back where it belongs takes all of the adventure out of life.”

This from the person who has a sign by the bed: “A place for everything and everything in its place.”

In the meantime, he took the Easy-Off Oven Cleaner into his office. He says he has no clue why he did this. I mean, there isn't a grungy oven in there that needs to be cleaned, but there is one in the kitchen. He remembers seeing it in there near his work space, but, unfortunately, it isn't there now. He has no clue where it went.

I don't really want to clean the oven, but I do need to find the Easy-Off even if I decide not to tackle the oven. I guess another adventure is in the works.

P.S. The elderly woman I was visiting in the nursing home every Sunday died early yesterday morning. I am so thankful that I got to know her. She was a blessing and an inspiration. I thankful for God's mercy that she was being well cared for and didn't suffer.